Why does Gallup Polls act like a protector of the Beltway Establishment? They did a poll that showed that 71% of the people support investigations of Bush’s corruption of the Justice Department, 63% support investigations of warrantless wiretapping, and 62% support investigations of the treatment of detainees (torture). What headline does Gallup use?
No Mandate for Criminal Probes of Bush Administration
It’s hard to define what a ‘mandate’ is in terms of percentage points, but Gallup justifies their headline by noting that the public, given an option of a criminal investigation and an investigation by a independent panel, divides its support. In each case, the plurality of the people prefer a criminal investigation to either an independent panel or no investigation at all. You could craft many headlines from their data, but the one they chose would not leap to the forefront of my mind.
